Monday, May 07, 2012

Alcoholism among Native Americans

In the May 5 column, the Times Nicholas Kristof cites Anheuser-Busch, the company that makes the Budweiser and the bestselling beer in the US, Bud Light, for perpetuating alcohol dependence and addition among Native Americans and as an example of corporate greed and predatory practices. He calls for the boycott of Anheuser-Busch's products.

A small liquor shop in the town of Whiteclay, Nebraska (population 10; yes 10) sells about 13,000 cans of beer and malt liquor a day. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? Most of this alcohol ends up at the Pine Ridge reservation that is located just a stone-throw away over the state line in South Dakota, and which bans alcohol on its territory. With the a closest major city more than two hours away, Whiteclay is where residents of Pine Ridge go to get alcohol. The most of it ends up on the reservation.

Pine Ridge is home to approximately 45000 Oglala-Sioux Native Indians living on the swath of land roughly the size of Connecticut. Last year tribal police made more than 20000  alcohol-related arrests that made up more than 90% of all arrests. But tribal police has no jurisdiction over Whiteclay since it is in Nebraska. The drink of choice at Whiteclay is Hurricane High Gravity Lager, a malt liquor brewed by Anheuser-Busch. The tribe alleges that the whole purpose of Whiteclay is to sell to Natives since there is no one else around to sell alcohol to. The tribe sues A-B and other brewers for $500M arguing that they sell alcohol knowingly of its illegal import and consumption on the reservation.
 The effects of alcohol on the reservation residents are visible and severe. Kristof gives the following statistics: "As many as two-thirds of adults there may be alcoholics, and one-quarter of children are born suffering from fetal alcohol spectrum disorders." Alcohol feeds crime, domestic violence,  suicide, risky behaviors that lead to significant health problems such as injuries and sexually transmitted infections including HIV, unintended pregnancies, etc.

Beyond a boycott or a variation thereof, solutions suggested in readers' comments included shutting down the liquor store hoping those without cars won't be able to go very far to the next liquor outlet (you can see how those with cars will make all the profit), eliminating the demand (no word on how), closing down the reservation (!), expanding the reservation to include the White Clay store and thus making it illegal (you can see how this is an especially doomed solution),  taxing sales and using proceeds to fund education and alcohol detox and rehab programs. The blame is invariably poured on reservation residents for the lack of personal responsibility, on A-B and the likes for corporate greed, and tribal leaders for inadequate and incapable governing, incompetence and corruption. There is no

Several readers suggested decriminalizing drinking and possession of alcohol on the reservation. This might seem as a sure recipe for worsening the situation, but studies and experience in countries like Netherlands showed that legalization of (some) drugs (and certainly alcohol) moves the issues from the criminal system into the realm of public health, where it belongs.  Several more countries like Belgium and Portugal have decriminalized drugs. In the case of Portugal, which abolish all criminal penalties for personal drug possession including cocaine and heroin, illegal drug use by teenagers had declined, the rate of HIV infections among drug users had dropped, deaths related to heroin and similar drugs had been cut by more than half, and the number of people seeking treatment for drug addiction had doubled. None of the nightmare scenarios such as increases in drug usage among the young and the transformation of Lisbon into a haven for “drug tourists” have occurred. (http://www.cato.org/pubs/wtpapers/greenwald_whitepaper.pdf). It is worth noting that decriminalization does not mean legalization. In Portugal, drug possession for personal use and drug usage itself are still legally prohibited, but violations of those prohibitions are deemed to be exclusively administrative violations and are removed completely from the criminal realm. Instead of prison sentences, drug users and alcoholics are targeted with therapy and harm reduction.

Alcoholism is a severe problem on many reservations across the country; there are a number of causes that feed it, and no single solution is going to be sufficient. But whatever approach is used, it must be non-penalizing. Instead it should be protective of harms of alcohol and drug use.



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